To get your mangosteen seedling fruiting/flowering prior to celebrating its 5th anniversary of being planted out, it doesn't always take special treatment.Mine fruited at 7ft and at almost 5 years in the ground,being 1 foot when planted. It didn't get special treatment like dry season watering and regular fertilzer until after it first fruited.Likewise a grafted durian fruited within 5 years before weather took it down.I think the prolonged heat and humidity of the local monsoon season may give them a boost.I do however have a mangosteen runt which at 5 years is heavily branched but only 4 feet and nowhere near fruiting.

I really need to get mine in the ground, they will just not doing too well in containers. the seedlings I have are over two years old, and they are only a foot high. but they seem to be speeding up now, I read they have a very slow beginning and speed up later. the biggest tree I have seen here is over 12 years old and has not fruited yet ! but I think this is because its under shade, and is not fertilized or anything.

Logged

William" The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago.....The second best time, is now ! "

Some species are just hard to germinate; but how have the recalcitrant seeds been packed when you got them?

Before I was able to find live Mangosteen locally i purchased seeds on 3 different occasions from 3 different Asian sources. these seeds were all well packed, they arrived in moist peat, in zip locked bags and taped. non arrived crushed, some even sprouted on route, but not one grew. In this case I suspect it was the delay, the fastest order took around 18 days. since mangosteen can lose 75% of its viability in just 1 week, its no surprise. in contrast, the Garcinia aristata seeds I bought from a US source, gave me like 100% germination.

Mangosteen seeds that are well packed will last several weeks, and start to germinate inside the bag. The fact that the seeds were germinated but did not sprout indicates probably temperature extremes in route that killed them. X-raying of packages doesn't happen, unless the package is suspected of containing a bomb, or such. Most postal processing centers don't even have x-ray machines. The only exception is packages going to Washington D.C. thanks to the nut case that was sending white powder to congressmen.

William, that is Helton's website. He has a German friend that helps him deal with English and German speaking clients, and that is your last link. Helton is not only a great source but a very nice person also. I have received very rare seeds from him on a couple of occasions in very good shape.

[b]I can definitely recommend AGAINST buying anything from them. I bought like four things from them and they were old and dried, probably dead when packaged and packaged incorrectly. Forget them![/b][/u]

They have the seedlist regulary updated with current seed offer, they dont have all of them listed so need to check each year or sign for newletter (once a month)I bought previous year some seeds and vanilla cutting and all arrived good and viable.. delivery was 5 business days to me..

Hey Fruitlovers(Oscar) are you going to the conference meeting on the big island? I'd like to talk to you there.

I was planning to attend the conference meeting in Hilo. But unfortunately that meeting is at the same time as the orchard tour at my place. Kona meeting is next day but will not be able to attend that. Why don't you come to the orchard tour of my place? That is October first around 1pm. There will be van shuttles from Hilo or you can drive here in your own car.

Has anybody ordered from them, with the seeds growing true to species? The picture looks to me like a different laurel, perhaps it was mislabled. Oscar, you mentioned that you grew this plant from seed, how large was the pit?

Has anybody ordered from them, with the seeds growing true to species? The picture looks to me like a different laurel, perhaps it was mislabled. Oscar, you mentioned that you grew this plant from seed, how large was the pit?

Those photos show immature fruits, just starting to form. The pit is large, almost as large as avocado pit. You won't be able to get them from this company because 1) it says right on their sight they are unavailable and more importantly 2) any Persea species is not allowed into USA from outside the country, and that company is in Belize.

I did meet up with Jim at the conference. Saw his presentation. Fascinating stuff. He has earned his place in the history books. Anyone that can live a 3hour hike from the closest dirt/mud road has my respect.

He is definitely limiting contact. Has all the business he needs I guess.

I am going catch up with you Oscar. Bring my check book and clean you out. Ha ha. Lol. I just got to get a spare minute away from my wife's goat farm. Got to get some stuff planted before she takes over the whole 25acres. Haha.

We trek over to del's in Hilo enough. Just a matter of setting up a time.